By Jennifer Litz
Editor
February 27, 2008

Lieutenant Steve Mida is running, more or less, on the same platform as last time he ran. He wants to bring back honesty, integrity, and trust to the force.

“Not only do we not have it, but I think that’s what the public expects,” Mida says. “Law enforcement was founded on honesty, integrity, and trust. [But now], people don’t like to deal with the police department.”

Mida says the way to get back to the good ol’ days of one-on-one police involvement with the public is getting back to community policing: knowing where people live, and talking to them. “We’re into a numbers game now,” Mida says, possibly alluding to current police chief, Tim Vasquez, and his minimum work standards. “See how much we can get done in a short time period. That’s not good for the community or officers. We’ve got a thought process instilled that’s going to take a while to change.”

Some things Mida says need to change include the way the narcotics division is structured, as well as the structure of the crime analysis unit.

The narcotics unit needs more manpower, Mida says. But moreover, it needs officers on duty more hours—when drug deals and busts are taking place.

“Crime doesn’t stop at four or five,” Mida says.

Crime analysis units, Mida says, are helpful in profiling problem areas and times. But the current structure is not prompt enough to be proactive.

“We’re about two weeks behind,” Mida says. “You can’t be proactive when your info is stale and two weeks old; it has to be on a daily basis. You only have a [crime analysis unit] every two weeks. [The system] was developed in the ‘80s; we haven’t updated it to daily.

“It does nothing that compiles data from the previous 24 hours: possible mo’s, vehicles, etc.—anything an officer can get to on the street to try and solve what happened the day before. I think we need to train officers to do this.”

Another thing Mida wants to tweak about officer training: the physical fitness test. He thinks it should be waived for particular candidates, in the face of a current manpower shortage.

“This chief has also implemented a physical fitness test, warned to cut out everyone who wasn’t in shape,” Mida says. “But we can get them in shape.

“What you want is an intelligent police officer. We can put an out-of-shape officer into office and get them into shape. But it doesn’t work vice-versa. We need [candidates] that have the abilities and intelligence to do the job, and get them back into shape,” Mida says. He says the current batch of candidates will be given leeway in the physical fitness arena.

Mida didn’t start campaigning until January, after convincing.

“Last time there were lots of falsehoods against me,” Mida says of his last run. “That I didn’t live here, or didn’t have a college degree, and those are false . . . They said I was going to retire. Well, I’m still here.”

The thing he wants voters consider come ballot time?

“Look at your candidates, and decide who has the best qualities they expect in a leader,” Midas says. “And I believe that’s honesty, integrity, and trust.”